One Last Ride
by Ailsa89
Summary: There is a rule in war: to survive. But the survival of your friends often comes second...


One Last Ride

We heard the commands, yelled into the sunrise that rose with our despair.

"Reodd!" I heard you call and felt the yank on my arm that brought me down into the carpet now crusting Osgiliath's stone. Stench of death. The cold terror that seeped into every fissure of a man's body with just one encounter. It burnt my nostrils, poisoned my lungs and I gagged into the tangle of limbs cracking under my touch. But you would not let me pause, hauling me insistently through the chaos, fingers never leaving the crutch of my arm. We crawled, you and I, through unlit archways. We hid behind boulders. We wrenched the arrows from our path to allow us passage to out leader and to the horses. One hoof crashed down just an inch away from my hand. I recoiled with a cry, stumbling back blindly, cutting my palms on the shattered shields bearing our crest.

"Reodd," you shouted, "Get on the horse!"

I turned to look at you and realised how bruised your face was and how your pupils had shrunk to sightless black dots. I leapt up, thereby pulling you up with me. I heard the breath catch in your throat. I could almost sense it jarring in your lungs.

"You first," I said. You know as well as any how to tell a request from an order so you made no protest. Or maybe it was that you knew you were too hurt to refuse. I didn't ask you then. But then, only one thing mattered: we wanted to live. And, if possible, we wanted our friend to live as well. Although, so often, our own heroism died within us. Every man for himself, every man an island and every man alone in that attempt to survive. Still, we rode, you and I. Together. At the start of all things, it was you and I and not simply me. Not alone. I wanted you to live. Yet who was watching out for us? No one! We were alone! I suppose...looking back, whoever was looking out for us was following that rule. All they wanted, all they prayed for, like us, like everyone, was that we could survive this...

The horse was moving along with the rest. It took all my strength to struggle up behind you.

"One last ride," I promised you, whispering it over and over into your hair, "Back to the city."

"To Minas Tirith," you replied, determination never lingering. Filled my heart so much, those words, that all I could do was kick back and let the horse ride out over the bridge. I glimpsed Captain Faramir somewhere in the fray. I knew his father would not let this failure go lightly. Poor man. Poor men forced to follow him. Forced to die for whatever cause. All I know is that we have to get to the end of this battle. Then the next. Then the next. Until our last battle is fought and, whether we win or lose, just to have _survived _will be our victory.

There was a screaming then. Perhaps a quarter of a mile out and Minas Tirith gleaming in the hills. I felt dread cloud my emotions like fog and my feet hang limply from the stirrups. You clutched at your ears. I watched as the shadow crept up your back then swept over your head and I saw it; the Nazgûl breaking through blue sky. Even over the charge of a hundred hooves, the sound of those heavy inky wingbeats resounded tenfold in my ears. They clamoured bell-like in my ribcage. You were screaming and I had to loose a hold on the reins to wrap my arm round you and hold on.

"Shut up! Be quiet, be quiet!" I bellowed at you, shaking you in the vain attempt to still your frenzy. You struggled against me, I know, I knew. It still aches to remember. 

All of a sudden, to my deepest horror, the shadow descended again. Claws extended and the horse in front was pulled up and away into bleached horizon. The man kicked and struggled but only for a short time. He vanished from view along with the Fell Beast.

"Ride!" you shrieked. What more could I do? Our steed was beginning to flag. I kicked back but to little avail.

"Ride, damn you! Kick the beast! Kick it!" you went on, raving as shrilly as if you had gone mad. But I told myself, I still do, that it was only the incessant screeching of those vile riders. I yet have visions of blood. I could not see the grass for it nor the earth, so engorged with it.

"Faster! Faster or we'll surely die!"

"We will do no such thing!" I snapped. The stirrups clattered against my heels and I thought for one terrible moment that I should fall. I grabbed a handful of golden mane to steady myself but you suddenly knocked my hand aside. An instinctive reaction in your fear, I do not know, but I could not stop you. You leapt out of the saddle. Your boots struck me in the jaw so that I flailed backwards and you were out of reach or command.

You leapt straight into its reach. I wonder if the Nazgûl was surprised as such an easy catch but I saw no similar response in the black eye that looked scornfully back at me. What I did see there may have been the very thing that spurred me from my own seat. Who know what became of that golden maned horse? The distance it carried me saved me. I would be damned if I wasted that gift of life.

So that is why, when you looked down, you saw me holding onto you, pulling you out of that dark embrace. We rose up, you and I, and we flew, although I never once looked at the landscape below. There was only you and only my arms coiled about your waist. I saw you mouth to me, with calm intent, to let go. I did not even try to reply. We were all following our rule of survival so I was in no mind to make compromises. Or sacrifices, come to that. 

My stomach rocked as we plunged down again. The steely claws and scaly toes were creaking wide like the very Morannon. I held on. Know that! Remember that if you remember anything at all! I held onto you as the Nazgûl let you go and we fell together. Look at me! Open your eyes! Don't make it me and me alone. Don't leave it with no _and _at the end of my name. Don't go into that dark alone. 

A light...a light...and a while horse...oh, please, won't you wake up? It is a light coming for us! No more shadows; they are growing smaller now. Won't you even look at me? We shall survive. I shall not die! I will not be a testimony to my own despair! Take me, white rider! Let this one behind. Take me! _Take me_!


End file.
